Ten Fingers, Ten Toes, Two Nurses, One Goal

A NICU VAS Program to Improve Care and Reduce Harm

Background

Painful venipunctures can impact postnatal growth and have been correlated with unfavorable developmental outcomes in neonates. The high demand for vascular access in our complex NICU population placed heavy demand on our sole PICC RN scheduled each shift. We recognized the need to expand our unit-based team to support expert placement, surveillance, and maintenance of the right line, right patient at the right time for the safe delivery of essential therapies and to reduce vascular access related harm. We highlight one of the positive outcomes the expansion of our team provided: increased availability of ultrasound providers.